Jean-Baptiste Jourdan - Napoleonic Wars and Later Life

Napoleonic Wars and Later Life

In 1804, Napoleon appointed Jourdan a marshal of France. He remained in the newly-created Kingdom of Italy until 1806, when Joseph Bonaparte, whom his brother made king of Naples in that year, selected Jourdan as his military adviser. He followed Joseph into Spain in 1808; but Joseph's throne had to be maintained by the French army, and throughout the Peninsular War the other marshals, who depended directly upon Napoleon, paid little heed either to Joseph or to Jourdan. Jourdan was blamed for the defeat at the Battle of Talavera in 1809 and replaced by Marshal Nicolas Soult. He was reinstated as Joseph's chief of staff in September 1811, but given few troops. After the disastrous French defeat at the Battle of Salamanca in July 1812, Joseph and Jourdan were forced to abandon Madrid and retreat to Valencia. Joining with Soult's army, which evacuated Andalusia, the French were able to recapture Madrid during the Siege of Burgos campaign and push Wellington's Anglo-Portuguese army back to Portugal.

The following year, Wellington advanced again with a large, well-organized army. Repeatedly outmaneuvering the French, the Anglo-Allied army forced Joseph and Jourdan to fight at the Battle of Vitoria on 21 June 1813. After the decisive French defeat, which resulted in the permanent loss of Spain, Jourdan held no important command up to the fall of the Empire. He adhered to the Bourbon Restoration of 1814, and though he rejoined Napoleon in the Hundred Days and commanded a minor army, he submitted to the Bourbons again after the Battle of Waterloo. Greatly to his credit, Jourdan refused to be a member of the court which sentenced Marshal Michel Ney to death. He was made a count, a peer of France in 1819, and governor of Grenoble in 1816. In politics he was a prominent opponent of the royalist reactionaries and supported the revolution of 1830. After this event he held the portfolio of foreign affairs for a few days, and then became governor of the Invalides, where his last years were spent. Jourdan died in Paris on 23 November 1833 and was buried in Les Invalides.

While in exile on Saint Helena, Napoleon admitted,

I certainly used that man very ill ... I have learned with pleasure that since my fall he invariably acted in the best manner. He has thus afforded an example of that praiseworthy elevation of mind which distinguishes men one from another. Jourdan is a true patriot; and that is the answer to many things that have been said of him.

Jourdan wrote Opérations de l'armée du Danube (1799); Mémoires pour servir a l'histoire sur la campagne de 1796 (1819); and unpublished personal memoirs.